“He pretended to be a shitty customer and then fired me on the spot. Right in front of the other bartenders.”
She stopped dead in her tracks. “Seriously?”
I nodded.
“Do you want to go back? I’ll hold him down and let you kick his shins.”
I smirked. The idea of attacking Dean with Josephine as an accomplice sounded tempting, but there had to be a better way to get under his skin. I just had to think.
“No, it’s fine. Let’s just go to the apartment. I need to get back to my job search anyway.”
I caught her frown out of the corner of my eye. “I’m so sorry Lil, but I can’t. Julian and I have breakfast plans with his sister and then she wants to show me some of the designs from her upcoming collection.”
I’d been in New York for two days and already I felt like Josephine was too busy for me.
“Will you be back in time for dinner?”
“Vogue bloggers are meeting up for a work happy hour,” she recited, eyeing her phone’s calendar.
I nodded. Perfect. I had very important plans too. They included: emailing my resume to every restaurant within a one hundred mile radius while streaming a Pretty Little Liars marathon for background noise to fool me into thinking I wasn’t alone.
Chapter Seven
Dean
“Dean, you have to hire Lily back.”
I glared at Julian and he arched his brows for emphasis. “I’m dead serious.”
I’d walked with him through the park, explaining my side of the story from the night before. I knew I wasn’t one hundred percent in the right, but Lily definitely wasn’t an angel. Her attitude? Her personality? She was like a cat backed into a corner: claws out, ready to strike.
“Look, I know she’s your friend, and I don’t doubt that she’s probably a delight to be around most days, but those hotheaded employees never last long. Why do you think I have to work for myself?”
Julian shook his head.
“She just moved from Texas two days ago. She moved in with Jo and needs work. She isn’t going to make or break you or your restaurants. This is about helping out a friend.”
“Well, you’re asking too much of me, man. Josephine? She’s like a sweet southern peach. If she needed a job, I’d give her one in a second.”
He laughed. “I don’t think she’d ditch Vogue to go roll silverware for you.”
I clapped my hands. “Well there you have it. The job fair is closed.”
“You’re being a dick.”
I whirled around to face him. “Did you not just listen to me? I-do-not-like-Lily. I’m not going to hire her in my restaurant. Not now. Not ever.”
He crossed his arms and studied me. What he was looking for? I had no fucking clue.
“Wipe the slate clean and give her one more chance. You two didn’t meet in the best circumstances. Let’s go to dinner so that you can both bury the hatchet. If it still doesn’t work out after that, fine, but at least you can explain to Josephine that you tried not once, but twice to help Lily out.”
I hated being told what to do. Always had. I liked to listen to my own instincts, especially when it came to my companies. Unfortunately, I knew that banishing Lily from my professional life wouldn’t matter if she had already spilled over into my personal life. I considered Julian and Josephine to be my closest friends. For that reason—and that reason alone—I nodded and agreed to dinner.
“7 PM Monday. You pick a neutral territory and I want her patted down before I arrive.”
Chapter Eight
Lily
Nights I’d been in New York: three.
Nights Josephine had stayed at Julian’s apartment: three.
When I’d pictured my move to New York City, it was Josephine and I taking on the world. I’d had dreams of exploring the city with her. Y’know, experiencing our first mugging together, paying ten bucks in Chinatown to get our hair dyed, and then laughing days later as it all fell out. See? Fun! Unfortunately, it looked like I would be exploring the city solo. Sadly, I had the feeling that going bald by myself wouldn’t be nearly as amusing.
Josephine had been my best friend since we had buckteeth and Polly Pockets shoved up our noses. I’d made the move to New York City partly for her, but she had a new boyfriend who looked like the offspring of two beautiful soap opera stars, so I was no longer her top priority.
I sighed and shoved my hand back into the cereal box, only to find it empty. Blast . I could have wallowed in self-pity for another solid thirty minutes at least, but not without a constant stream of Cinnamon Toast Crunch. I had no choice; I had to leave the apartment.
I crawled toward my suitcase and reached for the first thing my fingers brushed. It was a soft blue t-shirt with a white outline of Texas stretched across the front. In the center, in a bold font, it read “Made”.
I cried as I gripped it in my hand. The tears shocked me. They were ugly and loud enough that the neighbors could definitely hear, but I couldn’t stop. I was in way over my head. I’d had one job prospect in New York City. Provisions was supposed to provide me with a steady income until I landed something more permanent. Instead, Dean Harper had stomped around like an angry wolf, huffing and puffing and blowing my dreams down before I could even begin to build them. Wait…that makes me one of the stupid pigs with shitty building materials. I cried harder.
My phone buzzed on the floor beside me and Josephine’s face flashed across the screen. She was asleep in the photo. Her dark hair was sticking up in every direction and I’d drawn male genitalia across her cheeks. It was a photo from our senior year of high school and it still made me laugh.